


Hineni, Hineni

by Katzedecimal



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Crisis of Faith, Existential Angst, Gen, Questioning, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-24
Updated: 2019-07-24
Packaged: 2020-07-12 12:36:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19946284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katzedecimal/pseuds/Katzedecimal
Summary: Metatron was where it started.  No...  Itstartedsix thousand years ago, when he gave away his sword.  Metatron was where he just couldn't lie to himself anymore.The gramophone plays laments while Aziraphale sings his Fall.





	Hineni, Hineni

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by Michael Sheen's tweet headcanon that the conversation with the Metatron was Aziraphale's Fall.

It was a dark and drizzly day, which suited Aziraphale’s mood. The bookstore was closed and the lights were off. He lay on the couch in the back room, curled up on his side, his back to the world. His cocoa was cold. 

He couldn’t stop thinking about his conversation with the Metatron. 

It was the worst conversation of his long life. Because even the Metatron wanted the war to happen and the Metatron was the Voice of God. Which led to the inescapable conclusion that God Herself wanted the war to happen. 

Which

Which

Aziraphale found he could just _not_ support. Could not condone. Could not believe in. 

If this was some demon’s attempt to sow doubt in his mind, they’d done a bloody good job of it. But he knew it wasn’t. Fact was, most of the demons weren’t half as clever as Crowley and all Crowley had to do was voice a few questions that were, to be perfectly honest, just agreeing with what Aziraphale had already been thinking in the first place. No, this doubt was the work of no demon. This was solely the work of Heaven.

Why in the… in the… in whatever, would someone spend so much time and effort crafting such an incredible creation, teeming with all manner of life, let it run for six thousand years, only to let it all burn? It made no sense!

 _Maybe it’s art?_ came the voice of Crowley from the back of his mind. Despite himself, Aziraphale smiled a little. Crowley **would** say something like that. Crowley who had voiced the same questions, who had ranted on at length about the dolphins and the whales and the gorillas and their bananas, and because he was very drunk at the time, quite a lot of his emotions came with it and he was _upset._ Crowley was very upset about it all. 

Aziraphale wasn’t upset. He was a little surprised by that. Instead he just felt… _disappointed._

Yes. He was _disappointed_ in Heaven. He was _disappointed_ in the Almighty. 

He was disappointed in himself. 

He uncurled enough to pick up the cup and drain the contents, making a face at the temperature. Then he sighed and got up to make another cup. He passed the gramophone and set the needle on the record, intending to listen to some Schubert. Instead, he got The Cure. He arched an eyebrow at the gramophone as the opening chords of _Plainsong_ shattered the stillness.

He’d suspected for some time that the gramophone had acquired semi-sentience during its association with him, much like Crowley’s prized Bentley. The Bentley never had a scratch no matter how roughly it was driven, never actually collided with anything though it threatened to often enough, played only _Queen’s Greatest Hits_ in its CD player, and liked to antagonize Crowley with stubborn shifting, sticking pedals, and dodgy lights. Aziraphale was surprised that Crowley hadn’t taken to calling the car “Christine.” 

The gramophone was much more subtle. It seemed to be attuned to Aziraphale’s mood and would play whatever was in his heart at the time, despite that he never changed the record. Occasionally it would tune in to other people in the bookstore and fill the store with modern music (which led to one memorable incident where it started playing _Add It Up_ by the Violent Femmes. Crowley had fallen off his chair laughing.) Today, apparently, it had decided he had 80s Goth rock in his heart. 

Well, it was certainly morose enough, he decided. He made a fresh cup of cocoa, singing along quietly. He sipped it and sighed, looking around at the restored bookshop. He decided to continue cataloguing, since Adam had added quite a few new titles but neglected to include an inventory. 

He sighed. Crowley had known for thousands of years that something was off in Heaven and it wasn’t like Aziraphale hadn’t believed him. He had, and he’d privately thought many of the same things, he’d even acted on some of those thoughts. No, he wasn’t surprised at Heaven’s behaviour. No. He’d just… always hoped they’d do better. Shape up a bit, sort of thing. He was bitterly disappointed that they hadn’t. But he wasn’t surprised. He sang along with This Mortal Coil’s _Fond Affections_ , raising an eyebrow at the gramophone. “Pretty sure that’s not on this album, old son,” he told it. The gramophone’s needle slid smoothly across the tracks into Leonard Cohen’s _Who By Fire._

Who by fire, indeed? In the recent weeks, Crowley had disclosed more about his ordeal of Falling than he had over the rest of their six thousand year friendship. Aziraphale knew very well what his side could do to angels who didn’t toe the party line. Ask too many questions, doubt the upper leadership, fraternize with the enemy… Aziraphale had never really thought of meeting for a drink and get smoked at cribbage as ‘fraternizing with the enemy’ but upper management took a much narrower view. He hadn’t met many demons other than Crowley but the ones he had… they weren’t in good health, by any definition. They’d been done by cruelly. Aziraphale had sometimes wondered how many of them had truly done something to deserve it and how many were like Crowley? How many had been punished harshly just for asking questions?

The music changed to _The Sound of Silence._ Interestingly, the gramophone had chosen a modern interpretation, not the original Simon and Garfunkel. It fit Aziraphale’s mood better and the power of his voice.

What kinds of questions? Crowley asked good questions, he always made Aziraphale think. He’d always thought that, if Crowley’s questions distressed the upper management so much, perhaps they were the kinds of questions that needed to be asked. Perhaps if they had listened to his questions, things wouldn’t have gone the way that they did. 

That… probably wasn’t an accident. It hurt to face up to that. He was used to humans behaving like that. Angels were supposed to be better than that. It hurt to realize that they were worse. 

He took down a shelf of new books and started cataloguing them. These were definitely Adam’s additions. They looked interesting, at least, and he decided to read some of them later. 

But again, he was _disappointed_ but not surprised. After all, there was a reason why Aziraphale had spent six thousand years preferring the company of the humans under his watch and the demon he was supposed to thwart. Heaven was… disturbing. 

_”Aren’t you lot supposed to be all woo-woo happy and harps and singing and walking on sunshine and all that?”_ Crowley had asked once.

 _”Yes, that’s it exactly,”_ he’d replied. He’d had thousands of years to observe who benefited from such a placid population. He rather preferred keeping his mind intact, thankyouverymuch, and getting his happiness from fine wine and pleasant conversation. 

The gramophone played _Troubled Mind_ and he glared at it, “No, you’ve just thrown the whole theme. Yes, alright, the lyrics are appropriate but the tempo is far too fast.” In response, the gramophone skipped and landed the needle back at the beginning of the song. Aziraphale shook his head and went back to the back room while the gramophone played some Dead Can Dance.

He sank back onto the sofa, elbows on his knees. The inescapable conclusion was that the Almighty Herself wanted the war. She had certainly done nothing to stop it. He couldn’t help but think of all the things She **had** done - drowned the world, frozen it, starved it, evicted a pair of confused and helpless newborn entities for pushing the Big Red Button as it were, like curious children are wont to do. 

Aziraphale had learned a lot about abusive relationships and generational abuse cycles, over the centuries. How were humans to break out of their own cycles when it was modelled literally from the top down? When it was literally coded into their religions? 

Nevertheless, they tried. 

The gramophone started to play another Leonard Cohen song, one of his last. Aziraphale found himself singing along with the words that would be deemed sacreligious by any of his brethren.

Hell wasn’t the only place where abuse ran rampant. Heaven was just less obvious about it. Micromanagement, unquestioning obedience, never think about what you’ve been ordered to do… and toe the party line, lest you be cast down.

_You want it darker…_  
_We kill the flame._

Angels were made of love. That was what they were told, anyways. But every time he went Upstairs, there seemed to be less and less of it. Every time he went Upstairs, the open hand of love felt more like a closing fist of iron. There was less and less of love and more and more of control. 

_”You cannot love someone and control them at the same time.”_ A human said that. He was even still alive. _”It’s gonna end in heartbreak because love is freedom.”_ If any of his kind could even sense love anymore, Aziraphale had to admit, he’d be surprised. How did it happen that humans understood love better than Heaven? 

_Magnified, sanctified, be Thy holy name_  
_Vilified, crucified, in the human frame_

He wondered whether Crowley was right. Was he the last of a dying breed, an angel attuned to love? An angel still capable of loving? 

_A million candles burning for the love that never came_

How did we fall so far?

_Hineni, hineni_  
_I’m ready, my Lord_

**Author's Note:**

> I made an accompanying Spotify playlist, [_Falling Angel, a Good Omens playlist_](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3HW9blpfUxxi518e0vd6Vq). Enjoy? Um.
> 
> BTW the quote is from Terry Crews.


End file.
